The big blue sign on the north end of the Piscataqua Bridge, which connects New Hampshire to New England's largest state, is as straightforward as the people who live there: "Welcome to Maine: The Way Life Should Be." Toss in its nickname, the Pine Tree State, and license-plate moniker, Vacationland, and what more does a place need to recommend it?

Pulled straight, the jagged Maine coastline offers 3,500 miles of sandy beaches, surf-battered bluffs, world-class harbors, and more than five dozen lighthouses. But one only has to drive the 155-mile stretch of coast (not counting essential detours down a handful of the fingers that jut into the Atlantic) between Portland and Mount Desert Island (MDI in Maine parlance) to experience the way life is in the part of the country where the late Charles Kuralt famously said he would send any first-time visitor to the U.S. "It's hard to say exactly what Maine's particular charm is, but two things stand out—the endlessly beautiful and various colors of the sea, and a nostalgic glimpse of a past America," says Marjorie Kernan, an antiques dealer and artist in Blue Hill, a town named for the berries that grow wild there. It has much to do with what Manhattan-based architect William J. Rockwell describes as the coast's "non-resortiness."

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"There's something very primitive yet resolutely human about it," says Rockwell, who camped in Acadia National Park as a young boy. "It's just far north enough that it's not easy to get to. It'll never become Nantucket or the Hamptons." He didn't go back for decades, until he was put in charge of a project on the island of Vinalhaven in Penobscot Bay. "And to think I resisted leaving the city for that job," he marvels. "I fell in love overnight." Most people do.

As it winds from the cobblestone streets of Portland's Old Port through the clapboard-cottage-lined villages of Wiscasset, Rockport, and Camden, to the craggy grandeur of Acadia, U.S. Route 1 provides a view of a world where hand-painted signs announce church bean suppers, parades draw entire towns to Main Street, and honor-system farm stands are the rule. The slow-going sister to I-95, the predominantly two-lane Route 1 forces the kind of drive long ago reserved for summer Sundays, setting the pace for impromptu pull-overs. Against a picture-postcard back-drop, just beyond the road's shoulders are terrific antiques shops and award-winning restaurants, not to mention wild blueberries by the quart, legendary lobster rolls, and a chance to get out on the water.

It's a pace that could infuriate a visitor still on big-city time, which is why Portland, the state's largest city and its cultural heart, is the perfect place to slough off your city skin. Downing a lobster roll might seem a logical starting point, but hold off. "Lobster rolls really aren't all that hot in Portland, not for those of us who live here, anyway," says Elizabeth Margolis-Pineo, founder of Epicurious Travelers.com. The 66,000 residents of Portland, dubbed the Foodiest Small Town in America, enjoy a disproportionate number of James Beard award winners, many spawned by—or drawn to—the earliest espousers of the locavore movement: Sam Hayward at Fore Street, Rob Evans at Duckfat, and Steve Corry at Five Fifty-Five. Bresca chef Krista Kern Desjarlais, a 2011 James Beard finalist, trained at Guy Savoy in Paris and Le Cirque in Manhattan before she opened her 18-seat bistro in the Old Port. From northern Japan by way of New York City, chef-farmer Masa Miyake found Portland the perfect locale for serving his world-class sushi at Mi- yake. If Portlanders crave any sandwich, it's the egg, bacon, and cheese at 158 Pickett Street Cafe?. When proprietor Josh Potocki couldn't find a satisfying bagel in his adopted city, he made his own and gained a cult following.

The city's equally fervent arts scene is concentrated along the west end of Congress Street, where the Institute for Contemporary Art and the Portland Museum of Art—housing an impressive collection of works by Winslow Homer, Marsden Hartley, and Louise Nevelson—anchor a string of contemporary art venues, including Space Gallery, which spotlights emerging artists.

It was Maine native Angela Adams, howev- er, who put Portland on the design map almost 20 years ago, when she began creating nature-inspired home accessories in her studio. Since then, Adams has collaborated with Ann Sacks, J. Crew, and Anthropologie, and runs a store in the city's East End. Also worth visiting: Blanche & Mimi, a charming shop filled with vintage and new furnishings, and the wonderfully quirky boutique Ferdinand.

North of Portland, Route 1 shares the road with I-295 until you reach Brunswick, where the pace slows down for good. Along the way, pick up the ultimate Maine souvenir, L. L. Bean's Boat and Tote bag, at its flagship in the outlet town of Freeport, where brands including Coach, Polo Ralph Lauren, and the North Face line Main Street. It's the antithesis of Main Street, Wiscasset, a living museum of 18th-and 19th-century architecture set on the Sheepscot River and, not surprisingly, the antiques center of Maine.

At the Marston House, Sharon Mrozinski and her architect husband, Paul, sell exquisitely dyed vintage linens, fine antiques, and garden furniture plucked from the markets in the South of France, where they spend part of the year. In the carriage house out back, they've appointed two bright rooms-for-let with antiques; in the morning, a basket filled with pastries, fruit, and a coffee press is quietly left by the door.

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Resist the temptation to join the hordes queuing up for lobster rolls at Red's Eats, and cross the street to Treats, where you can put together a gourmet picnic of fresh-baked breads, charcuterie, excellent wines, and rustic desserts. If lunch can wait, hold out for the lobster roll at Captain's Fresh Idea in Waldoboro and eat it where lobster should be eaten: outside at a picnic table, preferably with a view.

By the time you reach the midcoast region, which includes Camden, Rockport, and Rockland, the urge to get out on the water peaks, not least because Camden's harbor, viewed from the exquisite Fletcher Steele–designed amphitheater, is among the prettiest on the Eastern Seaboard. Cruising Penobscot Bay in a towering late-19th-century windjammer should be on everyone's bucket list, but if the idea of a group sail doesn't appeal, drive down the gorgeously desolate St. George peninsula to Port Clyde, pick up provisions at the general store, and take the 50-minute mail-boat ride to Monhegan Island, a car-free artists' colony once frequented by Rockwell Kent, Edward Hopper, and, more recently, Jamie Wyeth. A collection of Wyeth's work, along with that of his father and grandfather, is on permanent exhibition at Rockland's estimable Farnsworth Art Museum, where contemporary pieces by Alex Katz and Robert Indiana mark Maine's ongoing role in American art.

For a dockside restaurant as close to the water as you can get, head to the Cod End in Tenants Harbor, where the lobster is served—with a rock for cracking—at picnic tables overlooking a harbor filled with lobster boats and sailors tying up for dinner.

It's not all about the water, though; Aldermere Farm in Rockport draws artists and photographers to its fields of roaming belted Galloway cows, and the gardens at the charming open-air Vesper Hill Children's Chapel on Beauchamp Point make a delightful place to picnic. In Camden, tiny Francine Bistro is a tough reservation, but when fresh corn soup and Pemaquid oysters are on the menu, it's worth persevering.

There are dozens of worthy—if not essential—stops between Camden and Mount Desert Island, including antiques and fine art at Ten High Street, north of downtown Camden; Windsor Chair-makers in Lincolnville; Swans Island in Northport for blankets; restaurants Chase's Daily and the Lost Kitchen in Belfast; and Blue Hill Antiques and the eccentric used-book shop Red Gap, cofounded by writer Jonathan Lethem, in Blue Hill.

Once you reach the island, however, you may never want to leave. Glorified in the 19th century by the Hudson River School painters Thomas Cole and Frederic Church, Mount Desert Island—the largest of 3,000 islands along the Maine coast—later became a Gilded Age summer colony. The Rockefellers, Vanderbilts, Carnegies, and Astors all built summer "cottages" here. The draw was and still is the mountains, lakes, and woodlands that dot the 49,000 acres of Acadia National Park, where John D. Rockefeller Jr. presided over the construction of the 45 miles of gravel carriage roads now open exclu- sively to bicyclists and hikers.

Who better than modern-day magnate Martha Stewart, whose Skylands property in Seal Harbor was the former estate of Edsel Ford, to sum up the lure of this magical place? "Pink-granite cliffs, soaring fir trees, miles of pristine hiking trails, sparkling lakes, and whitecapped seas made me an instant convert to the Maine landscape," she says. "Add to that excellent gardening weather, lobsters and sea urchins, organic milk and cheese, puffins, guillemots, and ospreys—and you have a pretty good idea why the coast of Maine is perfection."